Sen. Doug Whitsett: Standing up for conservative values

The American Conservative Union (ACU) is the nation’s premier conservative group supporting Americans who are concerned with personal responsibility, traditional values, a strong national defense and the preservation of liberty. The Washington D.C.-based organization is the national leader for providing conservative positions on issues to Congress, the Executive Branch, State Legislatures, the media, political candidates and the public.

The ACU is the only organization in the nation to rate the conservative voting records of state legislators. It researches and selects a wide range of bills that reflect a member’s adherence to government integrity, as well as economic, social and cultural conservative principles.

This year, the ACU produced a detailed scorecard across the full spectrum of conservative issues for over 8,000 individual legislators in all 50 state legislative bodies. Legislators with the strongest scores consistently voted with the ideals articulated in the U.S. Constitution and reflect how they view the role of government in an individual’s life. Legislators in each state who score above 80 percent receive awards for their commitment to conservative principles.

Last week, the ACU released its 2016 ratings for the 60 members of the Oregon House of Representatives and the 30 members of the Oregon Senate. Representative Gail Whitsett (R-HD56) was the only member of the Oregon House to receive the ACU’s highest rating. Likewise, I was the only member of the Oregon Senate to achieve a 100 percent ACU voting record. We also both received ACU’s highest conservative awards in 2015.

According to ACU Chairman Matt Schlapp, “The Oregon legislature continues to churn out a liberal wish-list of legislation that results in higher costs to consumers for health care, housing and energy. The list includes complex notification requirements for landlords of apartment buildings, forcing insurance companies to pay physician rates to non-physicians, and making Oregon the first state in the nation to ban coal fired power plants. Fortunately, a House-passed bill that would have allowed the state police to indefinitely hold up a firearms sale was not taken up in the Senate.”